


To Heart and Home

by WalkingInland



Category: Outlander & Related Fandoms, Outlander Series - Diana Gabaldon
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Book 3: Voyager, F/M, Season 3
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-12
Updated: 2019-01-20
Packaged: 2019-09-17 03:02:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16966467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WalkingInland/pseuds/WalkingInland
Summary: What if the stones didn't work, and Claire couldn't go back? It's a season 3 fix-it....





	1. Chapter 1

Claire, April 16th 1746

It didn’t work. It didn’t work it didn’t work it didn’t work.

Oh thank God.

Oh God, what now?

Thoughts tumbled down in a never-ending stream, mixed with a jumble of confused emotions. Joy. Terror. Grief. Unbelief.

_Oh God, what now?_

 

Claire, April 21st 1746

She had spent five days in this dank cell.

Five days spent trying to figure out where the hell her life had gone so wrong. She was supposed to have touched the stones and escaped back to the twentieth century, leaving her heart behind her for the sake of their shared promise of their future.

She didn’t know why the stones hadn’t worked. She had heard the screaming, had felt the pull toward them, had touched them and felt like she was being torn apart. But instead of waking up in 1948, she had come to herself with the cannons of Culloden still roaring in her ears. She couldn’t have been unconscious for more than a few minutes, but it was long enough for Jamie to be lost to her forever in the battle below.

Escaping from Craig Na Dun undetected had proved fruitless; the redcoats had swarmed the area surrounding Culloden immediately following the battle, and she had been easily captured trying to slip through the heather. They had dragged her off without asking for any more information and had thrown her in this cell without letting her explain herself. Not that she would have been able to.

Five days spent thinking of some sort of story to tell to get her and her child out of here alive.

When the harried young soldier questioning her realized that she was English, albeit a Scot by marriage, he told her to sit and wait for his superior officer.

 

\-------------------------------

 

When the officer asked for her name, she gave it as Elizabeth MacTavish.

She knew it was foolish to give any name that could possibly be traced back to Jamie, or their mutual charges of treason, but she couldn’t help herself. She couldn’t bear to go back to using her maiden name, to act as if her identity had not becoming so deeply rooted and intertwined in him that it was impossible to separate herself from him. It didn’t matter that he was gone. She needed to feel connected to him, her heart, in some way if she was going to survive this. If this was all she could manage, then so be it. She refused to raise Jamie’s child completely removed from their heritage, even if they could never know the whole of it.

“MacTavish?” the officer questioned with raised brows, “You’ll excuse me ma’am, but you don’t seem very Scottish to me.”

“No, I’m not. My husband is….” It was all she could do to fix her mistake without curling up in a ball on the floor. “My husband _was_ , however.”

“He’s dead then?”

It was like she was standing outside of herself, screaming to give any other answer, for the truth to be anything but what it was. She took a deep breath and pushed that screaming part of herself away.

“Yes. Yes, he is.”

 

Harold Grey, April 21st 1746

“Well, Mrs. MacTavish, be that as it may, he _was_ Scottish. And when a Scottish widow is found wandering the moor immediately following a battle in which those same Scottish rebels were defeated, I have obvious assumptions to draw. As did the soldiers who originally arrested you. I will be honest with you, madam, it does not paint a promising picture for you.”

Harold Grey was tired. He was tired of fighting, executions, and burials. He wanted to be on his way out of rainy, godforsaken, bloody Scotland and on the road to home and his family. The very last thing he wanted to be doing was dealing with widow prisoners.

“Now, I am a fair man. I am not one to normally throw a woman in prison for no good reason. However. These are no normal circumstances. The lieutenant who filed your arrest papers has already sent them to my commanding officers, and there is not much I can do about that now.”

Hal didn’t like any part of this. The woman was obviously heartbroken, exhausted, and starving; she seemed only to be half present, as if her mind was in a complete other location, with someone else.

Arresting destitute widows was not what he had joined the army to do. Nevertheless, he had his duty to fulfill. He had already broken his responsibility to his superiors once this week, for the sake of his brother and his family’s honor.

_Bloody Fraser._

Now because of letting that wretched Scot go, Hal would have to follow his orders even more strictly than normal.

Deep breath.

_Damn._

“Madam, I am sorry to say that your arrest as a prisoner of war and a traitor will have to move forward.”

That seemed to get her attention somehow. The woman’s head snapped up, and her vacant expression was suddenly touched with a note of panic.

“Sir,” she started slowly, hesitantly, “I’m afraid you may not understand the full circumstances of my situation…”

“No, Mrs. MacTavish, I am afraid I understand far too well.” Hal was tired. He needed to be rid of this woman and on his way out of this damn grey country as soon as he could manage. “You were caught fleeing the field of a rebel battleground, obviously attempting to evade His Majesty’s soldiers. You have admitted to being the wife of a Scot, and have provided no extenuating circumstances or evidence that both of you were not traitors in the recent rebellion. In fact, - “

“I’m pregnant, Major. That is my extenuating circumstance.”

 _Damn_.

\--------------------------------

 

Harold Grey never wanted to see Scotland again. The damn place had brought too much chaos and dishonor into his and his family’s lives. Young John would never be the same again. And he had somehow managed to saddle himself with a charge in the person of Elizabeth MacTavish. After her revelation during the questioning, Hal had known that he would not be able to settle his conscious unless he found a way around her imprisonment. He had pulled every string and called in every favor he could think of to arrange her parole, and he had finally managed to find a modicum of peace with the situation.

So here he was, riding to the Dunsany family estate with a Scottish widow in tow. After he finalized the details of her parole with Dunsany, he would hopefully only have to deal with the beastly situation on rare occasions. She and her child would be safely tucked away at Helwater, and Harold could move on with his life.

The woman had been extremely silent ever since they started their journey. Her gaze was often distant on the horizon and she only communicated when absolutely necessary. He had assured her that she would able to raise her child in peace at Helwater, for only Lord Dunsany knew the true nature of her situation; the rest of the family and estate would be told that she was simply a refugee and acquaintance of the Grey family, escaping the strife of Scotland.

Hal hoped that she would find whatever it was that she was looking for when she looked to the horizon.

_Lord knows we could all do with a little peace._

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

Jamie, April 1754

Peace. It was the one thing Jamie Fraser wanted. Peace to hide in his numbness, to only venture into feeling when it would be safe. To have some limited freedoms, to work with his hands, to have some small sense of purpose; these were all things that could make his life bearable. But above all, peace.

The last eight years of his life had been a never-ending cycle of imprisonment, whether of his mind in a cave or his body in prison. This estate may just be a fresh start; while not entirely free, Jamie somehow knew that there were possibilities of open doors in this place that he never could have imagined.

\------------------------------

Jamie had had pervasive and vivid troubling dreams for the past eight years. Dreaming itself was nothing new to him. He had dreamed his whole life. He dreamed of memories, hopes, griefs, and nightmares. They had always been vivid. The last eight years were no exception; he dreamed of his childhood, his family, Lallybroch, Paris and all that happened there.

The stone walls of Wentworth Prison.

Culloden.

But most of all he dreamed of his wife and child. Claire. Claire was always as clear as day. He could envision every part of her, smell her hair, hear her ringing laugh, touch her flawless skin. He could build her in his dreams as if she stood true before him, and in his moments of sleep he could find peace in her arms once again.

Dreams of Claire, while giving a moment of heartache momentarily upon waking, did not cause his mind any great or lasting trouble. He knew it was his lot to wait for her, and wait he would, no matter how long it took. But he could not be troubled by anything that drew her near to him again, no matter how fleeting the peace.

No, the dreams that caused Jamie to periodically lie sleepless in numbing grief were those of his child. He had realized long ago that this sorrow was different somehow from the pain of losing Faith. He had seen Faith grow in his wife’s body, had had the time and space to both openly celebrate her life and openly mourn her death. Through Claire’s descriptions, he had been able to see his daughter in his mind’s eye and could envision her clearly. He had stood by her graveside.

But this one. This one now living two hundred years in the future. He would never know the appearance of his own child, so how was he to build them in his mind and hold them in his dreams? Did he have a son or a daughter? Was their hair his own red or their mother’s multifaceted brown? How was he to grieve someone whom he had never met? In whose life he rejoiced, but whose absence left a hole in his heart?

This night, surrounded by new sounds, new smells, and an unknown future, Jamie did what he had been doing for the last eight long years.

He prayed.

_Lord, that she may be safe. She and the child._

\------------------------------

“Who are you? I’ve never seen you here before.”

Of all the sounds common in a stable, the small voice of a young girl was the last noise that Jamie expected to hear. He turned from the stall he was mucking out to see bright curious blue eyes peeking out from around the stable doors.

“Well no lass, I don’t suppose you would have. ‘Tis just my second day here.” As the girl slipped more fully into the stable, Jamie was able to see more of her, from her muddy hem to her dark red hair.

“Did you come with Lord John? I saw him coming up over the rise earlier. And what’s your name? You didn’t say. I mustn’t stay if I don’t know your name, my mama says I mustn’t talk to strangers.”

Jamie smiled at the girl’s topic jumping and child logic. She minded him of his own nieces and nephews and their ramblings.

“Well then lass, your mother’s right. Ye must always be careful around strangers.”

The little girl just kept peering at him from around a post, obviously waiting for him to introduce himself. Jamie stepped a bit closer to her and crouched down closer to her level, but didn’t want to move too quickly to startle her. She seemed to be about seven years old; a confident child, but in all his years of being an uncle he had learned that you never really could tell if a child was truly comfortable or just putting on a good face, at least at first.

“Alright, I’ll go first. You’re right, I did come with Lord John; I’m to be the new stable hand. My name’s Alexander MacKenzie.”

The girl seemed to be considering that, mouthing his name over to herself, but volunteering no other information.

“Well, I canna keep calling ye ‘lass’ now, can I?” Jamie paused a moment to be sure he had her attention, “Your turn now, what can I be calling you?”

She tilted her head a bit, obviously conflicted over whether he counted as a stranger anymore, and if she was really supposed to tell him anything.

“Well… I s’pose Mama won’t mind. My name’s Brianna, but don’t call me that. No one calls me that except for Missus Keren when she’s cross at me for taking an extra scone. Everybody calls me Bree.”

She paused a moment for breath, and then continued on, “You talk different. Are you Scottish? My Da’s Scottish.”

Before Jamie could think or react to this rapid change in topic, there was a loud voice calling from outside the stable.

“BRIANNA! I shouldn’t have to tell you again, you must finish your chores inside before you go wandering all about! And I had better not find you with muck all covering your dress! What would your mother say if she knew what you were up to?”

The girl’s eyes went as wide as saucers for a brief moment and then she was gone with a swirl of red hair, leaving Jamie crouched on the floor of the stables, feeling as if he were trying to recover from a very small, very opinionated, young whirlwind.

\------------------------------

“Who’s the lass, then?” Jamie knew it was perhaps none of his business, but there was something about this child that he could not get out of his mind, something that he could not quite put his finger on. He also recognized in the stable hand a love for gossip; the more Jamie could keep the topic away from himself the better.

“Oh, little Brianna? She’s a handful, isn’t she? Her and her mother are tenants here on the estate. Though between you and me, they’re more of a charity case than tenants.

Jamie hesitated a moment, his hand pausing in its brushing, before asking the question that had been niggling at the back of his mind since the child had mentioned it. “The wean said her father is Scottish?”

“Yes, that’s right. Or, _was_ Scottish would be more accurate. He’s dead.”

“Is that what ye meant by them being a charity case then? The husband died but the family has kept them on as tenants?”

Crusoe raised his brows, “No it’s more than that. Mistress MacTavish married a highland farmer and lived with him in Scotland for a time. Little good it did her. The man died after the Rising and left her alone before the little one was born, poor woman. She’s made shift only by the charity of first the Greys and now with the Dunsaneys. She’s an odd one though, I will say. Never remarried. Uncommon bold for a woman. Obviously well educated, seems to be from a good family. How she ended up marrying a highland farmer, I’ll never understand.”

As Crusoe was speaking, Jamie could feel his breath coming shorter and shorter. He had to force himself to unclench his jaw and pry his fingers from their choke hold on the brush he was supposed to be working with.

_Christ, man. It’s no’ her, pull yourself together._

It was a common enough story – widowed wife of a Scottish rebel, seeking charity through any means possible – that it shouldn’t have shaken him to his core as it had. But she was well educated, opinionated, going by the name MacTavish, and then there was this redhaired child…

_No. Don’t let yourself think it. It’s no’ them. You sent them through the stones yourself._

“You alright, man? You’ve turned white as a sheet!”

He obviously hadn’t schooled his expression as well as he thought he had.

“Aye, I’m fine. Jus’ felt a bit off there for a moment. It’s passed.”

And it had. He _knew_ this child was not the one he had sent through the stones to protect. He _knew_ this strange woman was not his wife.

But knowing and grieving are two very different things.

\------------------------------

That night, Jamie Fraser dreamt of a spit-fire girl with curling red hair.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading!! I truly appreciate it so very much. Let me know what you think; feedback is always welcome!  
> Once again, I'm not sure when the next chapter will post. Life is going to continue to be very hectic for the next month or two, so we'll see. Hopefully I'll be able to set aside some time to write, at least enough to keep me sane in all the craziness.  
> ❤❤


	3. Chapter 3

Jamie, Late April, 1754

“Where’s yer Mam lass? Does it no’ concern her for ye to be wandering about the grounds?” Jamie didn’t mind the girl coming to watch the horses, and he couldn’t deny that she was a fair hand with them. But he also didn’t want to get on the wrong side of her mother. He had been at the estate barely a week, and the last thing he needed was to stir up trouble among the residents, especially if this girl’s mother was as strong headed as she sounded.  

Bree shrugged, brush in hand, trying to peer over a stall door to get a glimpse of a new foal. “Mama doesn’t mind, as long as I’m done my studies in the mornings and have finished helping with the chores. She says it’s good for me to learn about the horses and things.” She squinted as she turned to look up at him consideringly. “You’re much nicer than Crusoe though. He doesn’t let me help much. Mama calls him an old grump.”

Jamie couldn’t hold back a laugh as she clapped a hand over her mouth. “You can’t tell him I said so though! Mama said not to say!”

Oh, dinna fash. I willna say a thing to Crusoe or to your mother.” He hesitated a moment, his hands pausing over the bridle he was mending, before asking his next question, “Where is this mam of yours? She sounds like she has quite a bit to say on all kinds o’ things.” Indeed, Jamie had lost count in the last few days of the number of Brianna’s sentences that started with the phrase “my Mama says.”

Brianna’s face fell for a moment, distracted from her perusal of the new foal. “Oh, Mama’s away right now. She went away with Lord John when he came with you last week. She said he had a job for her and she’ll be gone for a bit.” Her mouth turned up a bit at the corners as she tried to encourage herself, “But she’ll be back! She said she would be, and Mama says we’ll have each other always. So she’ll be back.”

Jamie could tell that the lass was trying to put a brave face on a situation that obviously frightened her. He bent his head over a tricky part of the bridle, giving her a moment to pull herself together. His curiosity soon took over however.

_What on earth could the Englishman want with this woman? What task could she possibly perform for him?_

“Ye said he went with Lord John, lassie?”

“Mmmhmm,” Bree murmured, now more interested in exploring the space behind the feed barrels.

“Do ye ken what job he had for her?” Despite the… understanding… he and John had come to, Jamie still didn’t completely trust the man. And he found himself feeling oddly protective of this strange woman who seemed to be all alone except for a young daughter.

Brianna shrugged again. “I dunno really. Somebody’s probably sick. That’s usually why Mama has to go places. My Mama is the _best_ healer. Everybody says so.” This was said with the simplicity of a well-known fact, but it didn’t stop her voice from glowing with pride all the same.

_This woman was a healer as well?_

Before he came to this place, Jamie had been purposely and methodically attempting to push the thoughts of his wife to the back of his mind. He never ceased in his prayers for her and the child, but he did have to function day to day in the living world; he couldn’t spend the rest of his days living in the past. Or the future, as the case may be.

This mysterious woman – _this Elizabeth MacTavish_ – seemed to have been specifically designed to thwart his plans.

_Well, and wouldn’t that be just like Claire?_

Brianna, meanwhile, was now too busy trying to climb _into_ the stall with the foal and its mother to notice any lapse of attention on Jamie’s part.

“Alright then, Bree,” he said, swinging her down from the stall door. “I must be heading out to the yard, and ye canna be staying here by yourself. It’s time now ye were going back up to the house before Missus Keren comes looking for ye.”

Brianna kept right behind him as he started to collect what he would need to break in the new colt.

“But I can come _with_ you! I don’t have to be back at the house till dinner time. And _anyways_ , I get fussed at if I’m in the way up there. I could stay here and help _you_ with the horses! _Please_ Mr. Mackenzie?” She tugged on his sleeve, bouncing a little on the balls of her feet and peering up at Jamie pleadingly. “ _Please_? I’ll do what you tell me! And I’ll listen and I won’t get underfoot I _promise_.”

Jamie sighed, wondering if he was setting a poor precedent by giving in to the wee lass, but knowing he wouldn’t be able to say no to those wide blue eyes.

“Come on then, wee shadow. Let’s go.”

\------------------------------

Early May, 1754

Jamie had added another entry to his mental list of reasons why he wished that Brianna’s mother was not away from home. Besides the obvious nervousness the child felt at her mother being so far away, and her loneliness in having no family on the estate, Jamie had a few selfish reasons of his own. For instance, if the woman had been nearby, and able to be quickly spoken with, he could verify the many and varied things that fell under the category of “Mama said it was fine!”

As it was, nearly every time those wide blue eyes were turned on him in pleading, all his defenses fell completely away.

So here he was, taking his line of horses out to the hills. He typically looked forward to this task, as it afforded him some quiet and solitude in his thoughts. Riding on the horse in front of him today however, was Brianna. He still wasn’t entirely sure how she had managed to talk and wheedle her way into coming with him, especially since he was sure he had told her “no” at some point in the proceedings.

“Mr. Mackenzie?”

Jamie sighed. There was only so much quiet thinking one could accomplish with a precocious seven-year-old about.

“Aye?”

“What’s your friend name?”

_What in God’s name…_

He glanced down at her, trying to decipher what on earth she was talking about, to find her trying to turn enough on the horse to look up at his face.

“Sit still, aye? Ye canna be wriggling about like that on a horse, you’ll just confuse it. Now, what’s this about a friend name?”

“Well…” Bree stumbled a bit over the explanation, “I suppose… Are we friends now? Missus Keren said I need to have more friends to talk to, because she says I talk her ear off, but I was just thinking about it and I thought that I like talking to you. And I see you all the time, and I like helping you in the barn, so I just thought that we would be friends.”

Jamie was glad that he had already told the lass to turn around; he couldn’t have been able to keep a straight face if she had been looking up at him. As it was, he had a hard enough time keeping his voice from showing the laughter that wanted to burst out at this latest stream of child logic.

“Aye,” he had to pause again to get his voice under control, “Aye, if ye put it like that, I suppose we would be friends, wee shadow.” As much as he wanted to laugh, a part of Jamie felt sorry that the lass didn’t have other children about to play with, and his heart swelled with the honor that she trusted him enough to follow him about as she did.

Her little back relaxed as she settled back into his chest, “Oh good! But that’s why I need to know your friend name now. I want _my_ friends to call me Bree. And most people do. It’s shorter and much more friendly! But I don’t have a friend name for you! ‘Mr. Mackenzie’ isn’t very friendly.”

He chuckled again; he couldn’t seem to ever stop laughing when she was about. “Well, lass, I suppose you must think of a _more friendly_ name for me then. How did you come to have people start calling you Bree?”

This seemed to stump her somewhat. “Umm… Mama says she’s always called me that. Except when I’m in trouble. Then I’m Brianna. And _sometimes_ Brianna Ellen. But that’s only if I’m for real in a lot of trouble. Like if I don’t close the door all the way and the barn cats get in her herbs. So it’s mostly Bree.”

She craned her head back again in order to squint up at him and furrowed her brows as she studied his face. “I think… I think it should be something from your last name. ‘Cause your first name… _Alexander. Alex._ No, those won’t do _at all._ ” Brianna’s face wrinkled up in distaste for a moment, before settling into a mask of intense thought.

Jamie dared not ask what was so horribly wrong with his second name; he had never been very attached to it anyhow. They rode in silence for a few minutes, but Jamie was too occupied trying to keep her in the saddle as she wriggled about – nevermind _wee shadow_ , she should really be _wee eel_ today – to be prepared for the sudden shout that came with a seven year old mind arriving at a great discovery.  

“MAC! THAT’S IT! _Mac._ For “Mackenzie,” see? It’s a _much_ friendlier name! And it’s faster too!”

Jamie himself had already nearly jumped out of the saddle at the lass’s yell and was just now catching up to the point of what the yelling had actually been about.

“Mac, aye? Well, if it suits you then I suppose it suits me as well,” Jamie smiled as Bree _finally_ settled herself down, the great Friend Name Problem appropriately solved.

“Now, do ye remember what I said yesterday about turning a horse gently? Let’s see you do it now, _Bree._ Time to head home.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm alive! This chapter was kicking me in the butt at the same time that life was, so it took a bit to get it cranked out.  
> Thank you for your patience, and I hope you enjoy! Any feedback is much appreciated! ❤❤❤
> 
> Note 2/8/19: Hey loves! Wanted to give you the heads up that I'm not sure when this will be updated. Life has been kicking my ass the last few months, and fandom and trying my hand at writing has been my refuge from that. Unfortunately, fandom is no longer feeling very refuge-y, and I'm lacking motivation at the moment to finish up the last few chapters. I have a good dent already written of the rest of the story, but I'm not sure when the motivation and energy to fill in the gaps and finish it up will be back. I'll still be puttering around over on tumblr, but I'm just letting my try at writing rest for a bit until I get some energy back.  
> Thank you all so so much for your support of me and this little story, I cannot tell you how much it means to me.  
> ❤❤❤❤❤
> 
> Note 5/30/2019: Just wanted to pop in and say that I'm still working on this! It definitely has not been abandoned, but I've accepted the fact that I write slower than molasses in January. I'm picking away at the rest of the story and a significant chunk has been written but still needs work. I got some feedback on some things that just were not working at all and so I'm in the process of fixing those things, rearranging some bits, and filling in the gaps of my haphazard writing. I truly truly appreciate the kind interest that is still (somehow??) being shown to this little experiment, and I can't wait to get back to posting. I have no idea when that will be at this point, but probably not very soon.   
> tl;dr: I don't know when, but it will be finished!! Thank you my dears!

**Author's Note:**

> This is my very first time dipping into the writing pool, so I absolutely welcome any feedback, big or small. :)


End file.
